Did Oregon’s first female acting governor have a connection to Union?

Yes.

Believe it or not, when Barbara Roberts was sworn in as Oregon’s first elected woman governor on Jan. 14, 1991, she was following in the footsteps of a Union woman who had long ago been forgotten. Roberts was the first woman to be elected as Oregon’s governor but not the first to serve. That distinction belongs to Caralyn Shelton, who grew up in Union in the late 1800s, according to historian Richard Roth, of Orting, Washington, who has written many books about Union County history.

Shelton served as Oregon’s first woman governor (actually, the first female acting governor of any state) when she was handed the reins of the state for 49 hours in 1909, from Feb. 27 through Feb. 28. She had not pursued the position but was appointed it because she was in the line of succession as secretary for Oregon’s previous governor, George Chamberlain, who had just stepped down.

Chamberlain left Oregon in a hurry because he had been elected to the U.S. Senate and had to get to Washington, D.C., for the March 1, 1909, swearing-in ceremony. Chamberlain did not want to be late, since it would mean he’d then have less seniority than all of the other freshman senators, giving him a lower ranking when assigned to Senate committees.

Frank Benson, Oregon’s secretary of state, was next in the line of succession to take Chamberlain’s place as governor, but he was ill and could not be sworn in.

Suddenly there was a looming gap that had to be addressed, and Shelton was called upon to fill it.

“The practical thing it seemed was to turn the office of Oregon governor over to Caralyn Shelton,” said Roth, who grew up at Hot Lake.

Shelton accepted the appointment and served as acting governor until Benson was well enough to be sworn in. Shelton’s appointment, although brief, did not fly under the state’s radar.

“This development definitely made the news in Oregon’s newspapers of the day,” Roth said.

Shelton, then 32, served as Chamberlain’s secretary for more than six years before he joined the U.S. Senate in March 1909.

Shelton moved to Washington, D.C., soon after her stint as acting governor where she served as Chamberlain’s secretary for the next 12 years, until he lost a bid for reelection.

Chamberlain and Shelton were married in 1926 in a ceremony in Washington, D.C., after his wife died in 1925. The ceremony was noteworthy because it marked perhaps the first time in Oregon history that two of its former governors were married.

Chamberlain died in 1928 and five years later Shelton moved back to Oregon where she lived in Union and then Salem. She died in 1936, not yet 60 years old, and today is buried at Arlington National Cemetery next to her husband.

Roth said Shelton was born to pioneer parents, Willis and Mary Skiff, of Union, on Oct. 25, 1877. Shelton once told an interviewer that her father had come to Oregon in 1860 from Massachusetts.

Roth said her story is a remarkable one: “She rose from pioneer stock to travel the halls of power in Salem and Washington, D.C.”